


Writober 2: Electric Spookyaloo: Fics Day 17 : Face in the Mirror/Seeing is Believing

by indevan



Series: Writober 2: Electric Spookyaloo [17]
Category: Dragon Ball
Genre: Gen, Introspection, Self-Reflection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-17
Updated: 2018-10-17
Packaged: 2019-08-03 19:07:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 419
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16331807
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/indevan/pseuds/indevan
Summary: He used to study himself in the mirror





	Writober 2: Electric Spookyaloo: Fics Day 17 : Face in the Mirror/Seeing is Believing

He used to study himself in the mirror.  He knew he didn’t look like his mother. Their eyes were the same color, but the shape was different.  He pieced his father together from features he saw on himself until his mother finally relented and showed him the one picture she had of him.

Now he could stare at his reflection side by side with the photograph and see the similarities.  He would lift his hair and look at their identical foreheads. The stubborn lift of his chin. His lips, his eyebrows, his very bone structure.  It was all patterned after this man. This man he would never meet.

He knew what his mother told him, but still pretended that he had put a hand in his crib to stroke his cheek before he left to fight the androids.  That he kissed his mother goodbye before he flew off and died.

He knew better later, having met his father, that there was no way for that to happen.  Then he studied his profile and his own features for differences.

His hair, for one, longer now and reaching past his shoulders.  His eyes, bluer than blue to the point where, when they caught the light in the darkness, they looked nearly phosphorescent.  He was taller, if only by a little bit, and leaner. He carried himself differently.

He was different enough that he could pretend it was his alone.  And then it changed again.

And now...

He was older now, no longer a teenager.  He had died once, in a manner similar to his father, as Krillin told him because he had not that to himself either.  But he had lived, it felt, far longer than his years. Was this how his father felt under Frieza’s control? He thought of him now as he had left him, leaning against the tree and sharing a moment.  Hearing about what he did for him when he died.

He saw more of his father now, as Black rained down destruction.  In the way there was a shadow behind his eyes of what he’d seen and been through.  He didn’t hate it, not like before, but it wasn’t innocent comparison of someone he never knew either.  It was an inevitability when you lived your life in death.

The mirror was cracked and spotted, and two Trunks stared back at him.  Watched him. Mocked him with their downturned mouths and furrowed brows.  He closed his eyes, willing it away.

He no longer knew what he resembled.


End file.
